If you're having trouble beating him, really just watch what he does imo. Copy the moves, the distance you go and how high you can get really depends on what action you do first. I learned that the hard way, if you dash first, jump, you can dash again and jump once more (if I remember it correctly, I haven't played for 3 days lol). So you have to do different orders of moves for different parts of the race. Made me pretty mad and when I finally just sat back and watched what he did instead of where he went I figured out how to get to the top and not where to go to get to the top.